Kids, Safety and GPS Tracking

I suppose I should preface this by saying that, no, I'm not a dad. I want to be someday, but we don't have kids, so my opinions are just that, opinions. I'm not saying one way of thinking is better than another, these are simply my observations on the subject.

While I was sitting at lunch today, a couple of my female co-workers were also in the break room talking about an article one of them was reading in the paper. It was about a small GPS device that you can give to your kids that lets you know where they are at all times. She noted that it was small enough to fit in a backpack, and then exclaimed that all she would be able to glean from that is where her son's backpack was. I thought at first that she was being funny, but after listening for a little while longer it became clear that she was completely serious. She wasn't going to be happy until she was basically able to track her kid's movements the entire time he was away from her.

Seriously? This is what it's come to? Do we live in an age so rife with paranoia that we feel the need to track our kids 24/7? I know that it's important to have some idea of where your children are during the day, but at what point does it become too much? Parents already monitor their kids' internet activities, which they probably should actually, but where do we draw the line? Is it OK to listen in on your teenager's conversations, or maybe even run discreet background checks on their friends? To what ends will we go in the justification that it's for the children's safety?

When I was a kid, all of eight probably, I'd tell my folks I would be home before dark and pretty much disappear for the entire day. We didn't have cell phones or pagers (or fancy sliced bread) or a GPS homing beacon. For all my mom and dad knew we were off making pipe bombs and smoking weed. We weren't, by the way. We were boring children, but that's not the point. My parents understood that they needed to let go eventually. That I needed to be free to make my own mistakes, and if I broke an arm, like my sister did, it was par for the course and a great learning experience. Mainly learning what excruciating pain feels like, I imagine.

Now like I mentioned, we don't have kids, so I won't know what this is all like until we do, but I hope that when that day comes I'll be able to take the next step and gradually let my child make their own decisions and their own way in the world. I'll always be there to give whatever support I can, but I have no intentions of hovering over them their entire lives for fear they'll stub a toe.